whinchat

[ hwin-chat, win- ]

noun
  1. a small Old World thrush, Saxicola rubetra, having a buff-colored breast and white streaks in the tail.

Origin of whinchat

1
First recorded in 1670–80; whin + chat

Words Nearby whinchat

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How to use whinchat in a sentence

  • The whinchat may be distinguished at a considerable distance by the white streak over the eye.

  • The same is true of the whinchat, and one would scarcely expect to find this bird attacking Buntings as it sometimes does.

    Territory in Bird Life | H. Eliot Howard
  • The redstart and nightingale are most subject to this; it sometimes also happens to the fauvette, and also to the whinchat.

  • It is not so tender as the whinchat, some few of them occasionally stopping in this country all the winter.

  • Incidentally we may remark that the whinchat is also a frequenter of the gorse coverts and the moorlands.

British Dictionary definitions for whinchat

whinchat

/ (ˈwɪnˌtʃæt) /


noun
  1. an Old World songbird, Saxicola rubetra, having a mottled brown-and-white plumage with pale cream underparts: subfamily Turdinae (thrushes)

Origin of whinchat

1
C17: from whin 1 + chat 1

Collins English Dictionary - Complete & Unabridged 2012 Digital Edition © William Collins Sons & Co. Ltd. 1979, 1986 © HarperCollins Publishers 1998, 2000, 2003, 2005, 2006, 2007, 2009, 2012